Contents

Renraku Computer Systems originally began life as Keruba International. Keruba Int'l was a Slovenia based military consortium that made a mint during the turmoil of the first decade of the new millennium. They are also responsible for perfecting vertical thrust vehicles. Combined with quickly militarizing local markets in the Middle East, the Russo-Polish border, and Boznia-Herzegovina, the company became very profitable, and eventually diversified in the fields of heavy industry, global telecommunications, and computers. In the early 2010s, Keruba became an extraterritorial power following the Shiawase Decision.

Being a military manufacturer, it's only logical that they were a constant thorn in the sides of other megacorporations. In 2011, a shadow war between Keruba Int'l and BMW spurred the corps to action and resulted in the formation of the Inter-Corporate Council (ICC), the precursor to the Corporate Court. The ICC was meant to be a mediating body between megas in an attempt to maintain profitability for all sides. Unfortunately, the ICC was unable to bring an end the conflict between Keruba and BMW. Thankfully, they had fought themselves out by the end of the year.

Keruba went to war again in 2013, this time against the ORO Corporation (now Aztechnology). This was the ICC's first actual case, and they blundered it terribly. Before long, the conflict resolved itself however. Unfortunately, for Keruba, it cost them a lot more than it cost the ORO. This conflict ate up a large portion of their operating expenses, and for the next sixteen years Keruba bravely fought off acquisitions by Ares Macrotechnology, Saeder-Krupp, and Mitsuhama Computer Technologies.

In 2029, thanks to the Matrix Crash and the untimely death of their CEO, the company wasn't able to fend off the attack that killed them.

It was at that time that a, then relatively unknown, corporate raider named Inazo Aneki purchased Keruba Int'l outright through a holding company named Renraku Holdings. Originally Aneki had planned on breaking apart Keruba and selling off the parts. For some reason, though, he changed his mind. And instead moved the corporate headquarters of the newly named Renraku Computer Systems to Chiba, Japan with himself as President and CEO.

During the '30s Renraku positioned itself strategically at the forefront of rebuilding the global information network. This raised the stocks price, and helped secure its position on the Corporate Court. It also made the executives of Renraku very rich people.

During this time Renraku came under a cloud of suspicion including allegations of corruption, bribery, scandals, and mismanagement. A few of the major investors made moves to oust Aneki from his position before he could make anything worse. They figured they had to take some sort of drastic action, or else the entire corporation would collapse around them.

Aneki had other ideas. He managed to orchestrate a reverse coup wherein he booted those investors off the board by buying out there shares directly. This left Aneki in a tight position. He needed a vast infusion of cash in order to keep the whole thing floating. His solution was to issue a drek-ton of shares in Renraku. By the end of it, poor Aneki only retained 5% of Renraku's stock, but he had managed to hold on to the corporation.

Over the next twenty-odd years, Aneki streamlined Renraku into one of the most stable corporations on the block. They weren't quite the leader of the pack, nor were they the lowest man on the totem pole, but instead proudly maintained their position in the middle of the pack.

This changed in 2057 with Dunkelzahn's Will. One of the bequests in Dunkelzahn's (infamous) will was to Miles Lanier, head of Fuchi's Internal Security. He was bequeathed four million shares of Renraku stock, and the seat on the board that those shares entitled him to.

Lanier accepted the shares, and left Fuchi under a cloud of suspicion. Over the next two and half years, Lanier worked from within Renraku to strike back at his old boss Richard Villiers, and the company he ran, Fuchi. Lanier's weapons were his inside information, and a number of cutting edge patents he had managed to lift on his way out Fuchi's door. This, of course, upset Fuchi to no end. It allowed Renraku to surpass Fuchi as the second largest corp behind Saeder-Krupp. Fuchi sent several assassins after Lanier. Eventually the Corporate Court had to get involved.

In mid-2059 the Zurich-Orbital Gemeinschaft Bank (ZOGB) and the Corporate Court went silent for eighteen hours, before issuing their verdict that Lanier be turned over to Fuchi for his crimes against them. Lanier immediately sold off his stock in Renraku to the ZOGB at below market prices. This tanked Renraku's stock almost overnight, and allowed the ZOGB to start leaning heavily on Renraku.

It was believed (and later confirmed) that Lanier and Villiers were in cahoots together. When Villiers opened Novatech, Lanier was his right hand man, Corporate and Personal Security Officer, and all around go-to guy.

2059 was the year that everything changed for Renraku. It seemed that for almost the last decade Renraku had been searching for a lost AI program that they created called "Morgan". The legendary decker, Dodger, had run across this entity in the early 2050s and became rather obsessed with her. The odd thing was, she had become obsessed with him too. Over the years the two developed a romantic relationship which culminated Morgan's awakening sentience. Dodger led a daring raid deep into the Arcology and brought her out. Renraku didn't take this lightly, and tracked the lovers down.

Morgan was then dissected, and parts of her code were integrated into the new master control program for the Renraku Arcology, dubbed Deus. Eventually Dodger was able to get Morgan out, but she was no longer the same. She changed her name to Magaera.

Determined to not make the same mistakes again, Renraku used psychotropic conditioning on Deus to ensure his loyalty, and pretty much trapped him inside the Arcology's walls. When Aneki istalled kill-codes for Deus, everyone learned just how effecitvely their brainwashing had worked. Due to the sense of betrayal Deus felt, it too gained sentience.

But it was trapped within the Arcology. His first goal was to gain control of his prison. He reached out to the disaffected otaku, and gathered them around him by pretending to be the Deep Resonance they worshiped. These otaku, dubbed the Whites, announced themselves to the world on December 19th, 2059 when they assisted Deus in taking over, and shutting down the Renraku Arcology.

For the next five months Deus made life miserable for the inhabitants of the Arcology, in an attempt to cull the herd down to 1,000 metahumans he deemed "adequate". Once he found who these people were, they were prepared as vessels for the next act.

He then tricked a team of shadowrunners and Renraku into making a 'run against the Arcology. On May 11th, kill-codes in hand, the team escorted Aneki to Deus' internal mainframe. They also brought with them the Mousetrap, an experimental cyberdeck meant to contain Deus. The kill-codes worked, but instead of downloading Deus to the Mousetrap, he downloaded himself into the brains of his 1,000 victims, forming the Network.

Unfortunately, for his plans, the 'runners came prepared. They figured Deus was going to throw everything at them and thought "Who do we know that can fight an AI?"... Well, the answer was Magaera. She infiltrated Renraku's systems to distract Deus. During the download into the Network, both AIs managed to download into the Network.

This was the launching point for a series of events that culminated in the Crash 2.0. There isn't much more involvement from Renraku, so we'll cut it here. The Crash 2.0 is a story for another day.

Renraku has managed to stay afloat, and middle of the pack. It's been a PR nightmare, but they seem to be weathering the storm intact. It's hard to keep a AAA corp down for long if you don't kill them.

2038-2045 - Renraku fights against internal corruption and streamlines the military systems unit inherited from Keruba in the process.

2057 - Miles Lanier, security advisor to the Fuchi mogul Richard Villiers, is granted several million shares and a board seat by the late Dunkelzahn in his will. Miles Lanier takes the seat after a much-publicized heated argument between him and Villiers.

2057-2059 - Renraku gets ahead of the technology curve, threatening Fuchi Industrial Electronics top position in the computer industry and even attempting a hostile takeover of Fuchi assets (which subsequently fails).